The invention relates to application of a wax to a surface and more particularly to an improved means and method of applying wax to snowboards, snow skis, toboggans or other articles of manufacture.
Some commonly used techniques, such as hand application for ski waxing, apply several times as much wax as is actually necessary. Excess wax is then, after being applied, scraped off and discarded. As a consequence, the removed wax presents possible shop hazards, a mess, and obviously a great waste of wax. Current methods which are effective are either laborious or involve expensive professional equipment. The problems with ski waxing are compounded for devices such as snowboards and toboggans, which have much greater areas to be serviced with wax.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,308,633 proposes to solve the problem of waste, by providing a multilayer wax-impregnated carrier element which may be heat-applied, as by a flat iron, to the running bottom surface of a ski, the carrier element being removed while the wax is still hot.
Further, a wax-impregnated sheet product, available under the mark SKINS from its source having the tradename SKINS, has been gaining acceptance, again wherein a flat iron provides the source of heat needed to assure penetration of molten wax into the running surface being treated. But there is much handwork and therefore time consumption, not to mention personal skill and technique, that is required for a professional and high-quality waxing operation. The SKINS product relies on a wax absorptive carrier such as a sheet of cloth or of a synthetic material which has been prepared with wax to essentially only the density (i.e., quantity of releasable wax, per unit area) that a ski bottom can be expected to absorb. The sheet is cut to length as appropriate, and a hot household flat iron is the recommended means of wax release to the point of saturating the ski bottom, thus leaving only a thin, uniform layer of wax on the ski bottom. This product and technique thus eliminate the need to scrape off any excess of applied wax, and the mess and waste of the past are avoided. But, as noted above, the work is largely by hand, and requires more time and skill than is desired.